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[ARC REVIEW] ‘The Game Can’t Love You Back’ By: Karole Cozzo

Eve is used to being the odd woman out. As the only girl on her school’s baseball team, she knows exactly how to put sweaty, macho baseball players in their place, and she’s focused on one thing and one thing only—being the best pitcher she can be.

But when a freak accident forces her high school to be absorbed by the neighboring town, Eve has to contend with a new group of guys who aren’t used to having a woman on their team. And the new team’s star pitcher, Jamie, has no interest in being ousted from his throne. He can’t afford to give up his starting slot to a new pitcher—even worse, to a girl.

As the competition between Jamie and Eve starts to heat up, so does their attraction to each other. Can they keep their heads in the game, or will they end up getting played?

Rating: 5/5 Stars

Review:

For a girl who tends to avoid all sports and physical activity at all costs in real life, I sure love reading books about sports. YA romance books about sports, but still sports nonetheless. I haven’t read one about baseball yet though, at least not that I can remember. And this book was so. freaking. cute. I’ve been looking forward to reading it, and was so happy to have gotten my hands on it. (Thanks Jess!:)). I remember when the premise was first announced, and fell in love with it. And then when cover voting started. So you can imagine how pumped I am to be able to actually hold it in my hands.

The book is told from two POVs, Eve’s and Jamie’s. The problem with that is that it makes it harder to be totally on Eve’s side with everything, because we also know Jamie’s POV. I was all set to be all ‘girl power’ with Eve being the only girl on the team and all, but then Jamie’s POV had to come sneak up on me and mess with that. Obviously I was still rooting for Eve and on her side throughout the whole book, cover to cover, but getting to know Jamie more through his POV made the entire ‘which pitcher is best’ situation not so black and white.

I love how confident and strong-willed Eve is. She’s tough, and is clearly able to hold her own with the boys. I also liked how she didn’t want any extra or special treatment just because she was the only girl on the team. Not that I expected her to or anything like that, but I liked that that was addressed in the book, and how she viewed the ‘Sports Illustrated’ article that was written about her prior to the start of the book.

Also, I don’t really consider this a spoiler because it’s never hinted at as being a possibility, but I liked that Eve and her friend Scott were never put into any sort of love triangle with Jamie. It was refreshing to not see that. Marcella, Eve’s best friend, was a great addition to the cast of characters as well. Even though they have their ups and downs, as all friendships do, at the core they really care about each other, and their friendship is portrayed overall as a positive one.

Even the typical ‘mean girl’ in the story is multifaceted, and even though she can be jerky at times, she was never as cliché as a lot of ‘sort of exes who are now jealous of the protagonist’ tend to be, which was nice.

Eve and Jamie’s chemistry was great. I loved the banter between them. Who doesn’t love a great ‘hate to love’ trope? I could read them all day. It’s definitely the easier trope to build sexual tension in, and makes me ship the characters even harder as they bicker back and forth. That being said, the ending was satisfying, but I wish that it would have gone on a bit longer. I would have loved to have an epilogue of the thing (keeping it vague as to have no spoilers!) that is talked about in the last scene. I wanted to see more of them being out in the open and all cute in that way. (Which I don’t consider a spoiler because…I mean c’mon, what did you expect to happen?) I also would’ve liked if Jamie’s home life was explored a bit more. It’s mentioned throughout the book, but maybe a scene of two showing it a little more would have benefited the story.

Overall, this is an awesome read, and I can’t wait for you all to be able to get your hands on it. It will be released on May 15th by Swoon Reads, so make sure you preorder now!

Connect with the author!

You can follow Karole Cozzo on Twitter at @kacozzo and on Instagram at @karolecozzo !